Online Dating… Why Did I Do This Again?

Well then. In the 14 days since I signed up I have had 169 men view my profile, 30 guys have said they want to “meet me” and 12 guys have sent me a message. The messages sometimes don’t say anything, ,just “wink wink” but a couple of my favorites were “Well Hello Red” to “Your hot baby”, lol! The only scary one was the guy who said, after my gracious brush-off, “You’ll like me and I’ll like you with your red hair”… That’s a little creepy, I “will” like him. No thanks!

The first few days made me feel really good about myself, I mean who wouldn’t get excited about getting lots of messages and want-to-meet-yous? But reality set in when you actually start messaging people and talking to them on the phone. Here are the top contenders:

Chris – the first day we started “talking” we messaged for 12 hours. The next day it was 4 hours and then the day after that it was another 12 hours. And then a few more days of 4 hour chats… We are so very similar that sometimes I felt like I was talking to myself when I was messaging him, we are damaged in a lot of similar places, have a lot of similar likes and dislikes, it was really fascinating. I felt like we really connected, I could totally see having a long-term relationship with this guy. He lives 100 miles away and we exchanged phone numbers and started texting. A day or two later we made arrangements to talk on the phone but when the time came he begged off, saying he didn’t feel good went to bed and then he didn’t seem interested in calling me after that either… We texted for another day or two and then I asked for his honest opinion of me and we ended up deciding to be friends. The texting has completely stopped, he never responded to a text I sent him so I let him go. If he ever manages to come to town and wants to meet me I’ll let him take me to dinner and we’ll see what happens but I suspect that he has written me off because my last text to him was a picture of me with my new I’m-in-beauty-school short haircut and fantasy color, knowing that he likes long hair… Whatever, he won’t even call me on the phone, I’m not going to change a single thing about me for someone like that.

Mark – I responded to this gentleman’s message because it was more than “Hi” and he didn’t say I was hot, lol. Mark is not much of a talker, has bad spelling and worse grammar but he had a kind face and was interested in coming into town (he also lived 100 miles away) to meet me right away. But he also got sick, cancelled his trip and hasn’t messaged me since. He may message me again later and I’d go to lunch with him, we’ll see…

Jeff – This guy was fun and only lived 20 miles from time, we had snappy, witty messaging conversations and joked with each other and were getting along really, really well. But he didn’t ask me any questions about my past and only a few questions about my present. He answered my questions with brief replies and several times said we should meet but never even tried to set up a time. When we finally spoke on the phone it was the most awkward 20 minute conversation I may have ever had, lol. I think we are both more shy in person than we are in written words but he didn’t even give me anything to work with! He spent the 20 minutes talking about himself, his job, his brother and his parents. He didn’t ask me any questions and didn’t give me much of a chance to ask him any questions either. When he was done talking he said goodnight and hung up. I messaged him that it was nice to talk to him, he messaged back that he was going to bed but it would be nicer if he had someone to snuggle with… I never responded.

And there it is, the top three contenders in the first two weeks of my latest online dating venture! It’s not all I was hoping it will be and I have until the beginning of next month to decide if I want to pay another $30 for another month of this. Maybe I’ll switch services, ha, ha.

In other news my ex-husband remarried last night. I thought I would feel something, peaceful, happy, upset, sad… but instead I didn’t feel anything at all. It’s like they’re two strangers who don’t affect my life at all, imagine that! However, I am happy for both of them and hope that someday we can all be friends in one form or another. I was worried about my younger daughter who had to attend the wedding even though she didn’t really want to AND her father put her in the center of the front row, causing her a great deal of anxiety on top of what she was already dealing with. Both of my brothers drove down to attend the wedding and while I do have mixed feelings about that I am so grateful they were there because they ran interference for her. She told me after she got home that they stood close by, if somebody started talking to her and she looked like she was getting overwhelmed they would come up, ask if they could borrow her for a minute, walk her away from the person, give her a hug and let her go. I was so grateful and proud of them! It means they listened to me and actually heard what I said when I talked about her. It means they really do care about her and I take that as they really do care about me too. Which, I knew they did before, but this feels like rare proof of it. Thank you brothers.